Dangerous (9 page)

“Yes, Dara,” Crimson urged in a high-pitched voice.
“You’ve gotta come with.”

I looked at Scarlet. “Are you going to be okay by yourself?” I asked, worried that she would feel abandoned if we all up and left.

“Of course.
Go have fun. Besides, Chance is coming back with my shake right now. I imagine that he could use some company, too.”

Stone stood and pulled me to my feet as Chance arrived at the table.

Stone glared at him. “Come on, Dara. Let’s go.”

I gazed at Chance, and his eyes were on me. “See you later, Chance.”

He nodded his head, unsmiling, and sat down in the booth across from Scarlet, pushing her strawberry shake towards her.

Stone’s hand was on the small of my back, pushing me gently toward the exit.

As we walked to his motorcycle, I gazed back at the restaurant. Bright light poured through the plate glass windows, spilling into the darkness. I could see Chance sitting across from Scarlet. She was laughing and motioning with her hands, no doubt entertaining him so that I would be all but forgotten. I knew that I had told him that our separation was for the best, but as I gazed at his profile, part of me wondered if I had made the right decision.

I clung to Stone, my arms wrapped tightly around his lean, muscular body, as he rocketed into the darkness. I had no idea where we were going. He had spoken to Mike, but my mind had been sifting through its own thoughts, and their words had escaped me. I really liked Stone. In all honesty, I would’ve hopped on and ridden with him anywhere. That’s what scared me. Although I wasn’t necessarily a meticulous planner, I did typically try to make sure my actions would lead me to my end goal. But with Stone, things were different. When he was near, he consumed me. Everything else was shoved on the back burner, and I had difficulty even remembering what those things were. He accelerated up the mountain, and I tightened my grip, in awe of his rock-hard abs beneath my fingertips. I basked in his masculinity.

When he slowed down, I started paying more attention to my surroundings. He pulled into a long driveway, and I glanced behind me to see the headlight of Mike’s bike glowing brightly. As we made our way along the driveway, a large, brick home came into view. I couldn’t see the home clearly, but the lights that glowed in the carefully manicured landscaping surrounding the house showed enough that I could tell it was enormous.

As we rolled to a stop, I put my palms on his shoulder, pushed myself into a standing position on the pegs, and swung my right leg over the bike until my foot landed firmly on the driveway.

I removed the helmet and handed it to him as I stared in amazement at the house. “Where are we?” I asked.

“My house,” Stone answered.

“It’s beautiful,” I said softly.

“Not as beautiful as you,” he whispered in my ear as he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me backwards into his embrace.

Mike and Crimson, who had parked directly behind us, joined us in the driveway.

Stone released me and grabbed my hand, pulling me behind him as he walked down the meandering sidewalk. He unlocked the front door and opened it, gesturing for us to enter. Once we all shuffled into the great room, he closed the door and flipped on the lights.

My jaw dropped as I gaped at the shiny, hardwood floors, the cathedral ceiling, and the magnificent, floor-to-ceiling, arched windows at the back of the house.

“Your house is amazing,” Crimson complimented from behind me.

“Thank you.”

Mike walked over to a black leather sectional and plopped down. “This is what the stock market can do for you.”

“My dad has been fortunate with his investments,” Stone explained further. “He’s also a shrewd businessman.”

“Let’s watch a movie,” Mike said, picking up the TV tuner and pointing it toward the large flat screen that hung above the fireplace.

Crimson walked over and sat beside him.

“Watch whatever you want,” Stone encouraged. “We’re going out on the patio.”

I followed him to the stone patio. He took a seat on a chaise lounge, while I walked to the wrought iron railing and marveled at the mountainside shrouded in moonlight, which gave it an eerie, blue glow.

“It must be nice to be able to look at such a gorgeous view every day,” I said, not taking my eyes off the trees below.

“Most days I don’t even look at it,” he said.

“Why not?”
I turned to him, surprised that he could be immune to such beauty.

He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. My parents have been in Europe for a while. My brother has been away at college, and now he’s spending the summer in Colorado with a friend of his. There’s never anyone here, so there’s no reason for me to hang around.”

“Why didn’t you go to Europe with your parents?”

“I needed to work.”

At one point, I might have thought that his parents had fallen on hard times, but given the fact that he just said they had done well in the stock market, money didn’t seem to be a problem.

“You needed the money?”
I asked, a little confused.

“No,” he answered, seeming a little agitated. “It’s not about the money.”

“Then what’s it about?” I walked over to the chaise lounge. He was leaned against the back of it, his legs straddling it with one booted foot firmly on the ground on each side of it. I sat down on the edge of it, just past his bent knee.

“It’s about getting a job done. Doing something right. It’s about proving….”

He stopped mid-sentence. I watched his face in the moonlight, waiting for him to continue. “Proving what?” I prodded. It was so difficult to get him to open up.

He motioned for me to scoot closer. I leaned against his chest, my legs stretched out in front of me. He wrapped his arms around my waist, his chin resting on the top of my head. I could feel my heartbeat accelerate, but I focused on him, on his answer. I wanted him to talk to me.

“Proving what?” I asked again.

He exhaled. “It’s about proving to my father that I can do something right.”

“Surely he already knows that.” I rubbed my palms along his arms, until my hands came to rest on top of his.

“You know why I started going to Quail Mountain High?” he asked.

“Why?”

“Because I flunked out of boarding school.
My father was furious. He demanded to know why I couldn’t be more like my brother, who graduated with honors.”

“Why did you flunk out?” I asked, wondering if he would answer.

“Because I didn’t care.
It didn’t matter how good my grades were. In my father’s eyes, they would never be good enough. I would never be good enough.”

“That’s what parents do. They push their children to do their very best. Well, most of them do.” I certainly couldn’t say that my parents had ever fallen into that category.

“Let’s change the subject,” Stone suggested.

“Okay,” I agreed. “I did have something I wanted to run by you.”

“What’s that?”

“Remember when we were talking about the Fourth of July promotion for the bookstore?”

“Yeah.”

“Remember when I told you that I had a couple of friends who might be willing to braid hair and paint fingernails?”

“Yeah.”

“I was talking about Crimson and Scarlet. They want to open their own salon, and they agreed that this would give them the chance to meet some potential clients. What do you think?”

“Let’s do it. Sounds like it would be a win-win.”

“Really?”
I asked.

“Really.
But we don’t have much time. We’ve only got two weeks to make a plan and advertise it. We’ll start first thing tomorrow.”

“I’m so excited!”

He chuckled against my hair. “That’s what I do best. Get the girls excited.” His thumbs traced my ribs, as his palms slid to my sides and worked down to my hips.

I elbowed him in the stomach and was satisfied when a soft grunt escaped his lips. He moved his palm to my chest and whispered, “Your heart beats faster when you’re with me.” It wasn’t a question. He was stating a fact, and it was slightly unnerving that he knew it.
“Faster than the wings of a hummingbird.”

I swallowed hard, unable to respond.

Stone

Her hair smelled good, and I breathed in deeply. I could tell that I had made her nervous, and she didn’t know what to say. I remained quiet, content holding her in my arms while I waited for her to speak. I shouldn’t have let Chance bait me with his note. I should’ve put some distance between us and spent the evening with Jess instead. But I was finding Dara increasingly more difficult to resist.

I skimmed my fingertips along the back of her neck, and her tiny shudder was audible. I smiled in the dark. It seemed every nerve ending she possessed snapped to attention at my slightest touch. The gleam of her hair appeared almost silver in the moonlight, and I stroked the silken strands, appreciating the softness.

“Has a girl ever made your heart
beat
faster?” she whispered.

I stopped all movement, allowing her words to flow through my mind. Dara had a knack for asking difficult questions, and I frowned, wondering how much to say or whether I should answer the question at all. There was something about her that made me want to answer her, her goodness or maybe her innocence. There was something about me that sent warning bells ringing loudly in my head. I ignored them.

“Yes, once, a long time ago.”

“Who was she?” Dara
asked,
her voice as soft as a whisper in the stillness of the summer air.

I closed my eyes and let the memories tumble in my head. It seemed like a lifetime ago. To say it aloud would send the painful memories crashing back down. To say it aloud would make it seem terrifyingly real, and although I knew it was real, I had been able to deal with it by shutting it all out, locking it away in the deepest recesses of my soul.

She softly rubbed my left hand, which was sprawled across her thigh. She stroked my knuckles, outlining my fingers, as if her touch were coaxing the answer from my lips.

“Her name was Tiffany. Her family was renting a nearby cabin for the summer. I was sixteen, and I thought she was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. So did my brother.”

“What’s your brother’s name?”

“Dylan is my older brother, but I had a twin brother, too.” I blew air out between my clenched teeth. I hadn’t talked about my twin since the months following the accident.

“You
had
a twin brother?” she asked, waiting for me to clarify. She turned sideways, so that she could get a better look at my face, her legs dangling over my thigh.

“He died.”

She gasped.
“How?”

I rubbed my palm over my face. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

She leaned over against my chest and hugged me. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”

I laid my chin on the top of her head and held her close. She was so easy to talk to, maybe too easy. But I couldn’t do it. Not now.

I needed to be on my bike. I didn’t want these memories swirling in my head like heavy fog creeping along a mountain road, just waiting to wreak havoc.

“You want to go for a ride?” I asked, knowing that I would only accept one answer.

Dara leaned up and looked at me, and I thought perhaps I had caught her off guard.
“Yeah.
Sure.” She scrambled over my leg and rose to her feet.

I stood and led her back into the house. Mike and Crimson were curled up on the couch watching a movie.

“Hey, guys. We’re going for a ride. Stay as long as you want, but lock the house up when you leave.”

Mike waved his hand in acknowledgement.
“Sure thing.
We’ll probably leave as soon as this movie’s over. See ya later, man.”

“Later.” I rushed out the front door, feeling the overwhelming need to be under the night sky.

I tried to slow my stride, so that Dara wasn’t too far behind me as we walked along the sidewalk to the driveway. When I reached my bike, I swung my leg over it and grabbed the handgrips, relief washing over me and pushing some of the uneasiness of our former conversation out of my mind.

As she climbed on the back of the bike, I noticed the note tucked in the same spot as the previous note. One note was bad enough, but this guy was really starting to piss me off. I snatched up the note and crammed it into my front pocket. If Dara wasn’t with me, I’d probably take off looking for Chance. A few punches might actually make for some stress relief right about now.

***

The alarm on my cell phone alerted me to the fact that morning had arrived. I forced my eyes open, and memories of the previous evening came flooding back. I had said too much to Dara in a moment of weakness. Now she would be asking more questions, and I had no desire to answer them.

I showered and dressed for work. Thanks to my big mouth, it would be incredibly awkward working side-by-side with Dara.